Constants
by Universitas
Summary: Among all the changes in Shepard's new life, he wanted to be the one thing that stayed the same. *M!Shepard/Joker*


**Constants**_  
by Universitas_

Some M!Shep/Joker slash. This was gonna be a drabble in "Mass Mayhem," but the idea got too big for 100 words. So here it is.

I do not own _Mass Effect_. BioWare and EA do.

* * *

The Kodiak shuttle shuddered as it made its landing. Victor Shepard watched the door slide open to the familiar view: the wreckage of the _Normandy_—the first one—strewn about Alchera's icy wasteland. He distantly remembered trudging through the snow, digging for the dog tags of the old ship's lost crew, and recalling every single man and woman who had perished in the ambush. He had found his closure. Victor looked across the passenger hold towards the other man who had come to find his.

Clad in a simple environmental suit, Joker gazed at the cold graveyard. Victor saw none of his usual demeanor. "I shouldn't have come."

"You're the one who wanted to."

Joker looked at him. "I know. That's the worst part." After a few more silent moments, he slowly pushed himself off the seat. "Let's go."

Victor stepped out of the shuttle and watched Joker hobble to the edge of the hold, then slowly step off. Victor remained close in case Joker lost his balance.

The two of them embarked on a melancholy tour of the crash site: Ashley's favorite haunt on the engineering deck, where Victor had chosen to place the _Normandy_ monument; the remnants of the CIC, where Pressly had maintained a constant presence; the battered Mako that Joker had dropped in an impossible landing zone on Ilos; the crew deck, where Victor had started his mad dash during the Collectors' assault.

And finally, the bridge. The place Joker and Victor had shared drinks, told stories…

"The site of my…"

Victor looked up from the wrecked helm. "Joker?"

Joker glanced over his shoulder, then turned around. "It's… it's nothing, just thinking out loud."

"You're not the best liar, Joker."

The other man's shoulders slumped. "Yeah, I know. Still, I'd… well, you don't need to hear me spill my angst."

Angst… Against his better judgment, Victor said, "I've spilled mine on you countless times. It's… only fair you get the chance, too."

"Really, Commander, it's…" Joker sighed. "Shit. Guess there's no hiding anything from you." He slowly approached the evac shuttle bay, the one Victor had shoved him through just before the last bombardment blasted Victor into space. "This is where I… made the biggest screw-up of my life."

"I'm not sure I follow," Victor said, taking a step towards him.

Joker ran a hand across the bulkheads, a hand that balled up into a fist within a few moments. "Two seconds, Commander. That's all you needed to get into the shuttle. But…" He turned his head towards the helm. "I had to be an idiot and try to save the ship even when you were right and it was lost." Then, his gaze drifted to the floor, and his voice lowered to something barely over a whisper. "Instead, I lost a lot more than the _Normandy_. And it was my fault."

Those words—the sudden outpouring of emotions that had probably gone a long time unvoiced—hit Victor like a bullet. This was a side of Joker he'd never seen before, and one of whose existence he was completely unaware. "I… had no idea."

Joker looked at him with a weak smile. "That was the point. Remember when you went off on me after what happened on the Collector ship?"

Victor remembered all too well. His frustrations with the Illusive Man and Cerberus as a whole had reached a breaking point, and he chose to vent at Joker. _"This isn't my mission. All I am is just the Illusive Man's pawn."_ he had said.

"It's why I… why I acted like everything was normal. Figured that since everything else changed over the last two years—the new crew, your old team, your new squad, the _Normandy_—at least one thing had to stay the same for you. I guess that was gonna be me."

Victor stayed silent for what seemed like forever. Joker was right. Everyone else had changed: Garrus' sense of justice had been twisted into an overriding lust for vengeance, Tali wasn't quite the young quarian Victor remembered, Liara's experiences with the Shadow Broker had crushed her old innocence, Wrex had moved on to bigger and better things, and Kaidan resented him for his Cerberus affiliations.

But Joker was a constant. Even at the cost of letting his survivor's guilt linger and build up inside, Joker remained the person he'd been two years ago, at least on the surface. For Victor's sake.

He wasn't sure what he was feeling: pity, sympathy, admiration. Love? The notion seemed to sneak up on him, though Victor Shepard was no stranger to the feeling.

"Joker" was the only word he could muster under the ponderous weight of what had been said moments before.

"And if I got all that out… might as well go all the way." Joker turned around to face him. The next words to come out of his lips punched yet another hole in Victor's armor.

"I… care about you."

Joker's admission came as a relief and as a discomfort. It had been far too long since Victor felt… needed. Truly needed; his reunion with Jake O'Connor—his first, and maybe only real boyfriend—aboard the _Tenth Street_ hardly counted. At the same time, the confession brought more distant memories to mind: half-hearted attempts at other relationships, one-night stands, and finally just giving up on love.

But when he tore his gaze from the snow-covered metal panels on the ground and looked up at Joker, he saw the potential for something better. Better than even what he had with O'Connor thirteen years earlier. And after everything he'd been through with Joker, Victor couldn't say "no." He didn't _want_ to say "no."

Victor stepped towards Joker and placed a hand on his shoulder. A moment later, he moved in closer and took the man into his arms. "I don't regret anything. Neither should you."

That's when he realized it. This wasn't some newfound feeling brought about by Joker's confession. It just took this visit to the _Normandy_'s wreckage for him to stop ignoring his feelings and put them into action.

Because ever since the first drinks they had shared, the stories they had told about flight school and Elysium, Victor Shepard had been in love already.

* * *

Thanks for reading; let me know what you think.


End file.
